Liriano has pain-free throwing session
Posted on March 4th, 2008 – 12:04 PMBy Joe Christensen
FORT MYERS — Francisco Liriano threw about 45 pitches in a live batting practice session today and appears ready to pitch in a spring training game sometime later this week.
“I didn’t feel any pain, any soreness at all,” Liriano said. “I feel real good.”
It was Liriano’s second live batting practice session and fourth throwing session from a mound since he arrived in spring training. He is making his way back from Tommy John elbow surgery.
Liriano said he feels like he’s throwing his fastball and change-up well but is still holding back with his slider. That explained what those of us behind the batting cage saw, as his fastball and change-up looked pretty good, while his slider was wild and ineffective.
“I’m ready,” he said. “I don’t know what the next step is. They haven’t told me anything yet. Maybe in a game.”
26 Responses to "Liriano has pain-free throwing session"
Joe… Did the coaches have any comments about his pitches today? Thanks for the update.
Pitch him thursday against Baltimore. I’ll be there and would love to see him live. All these positive reports give me hope he’ll return to full strength this season. I see him healthy pitching 100 innings or so. 12 to 15 starts, the rest in relief.
It would be interesting to know how Liriano’s velocity was holding up. Does he have enough in his arm to handle a starting role now, or would he be better served in the bullpen or AAA starting to get it up to where it needs to be. No sense starting him if he can’t handle the innings and has to overthrow to maintain velocity.
needs to get the slider back and hell dominate agian
Liriano would be a hell of a rally stopper out of the bullpen for a couple innings. With the number of starters we have, don’t push him.
Liriano should be starting. Period. If he isn’t ready to start up here, send him to Rochester where he can go about the business of building his stamina and sharpening his command. No bullpen. That work is too irregular and not conducive to getting back in the rotation where he is desperately needed.
[…] E Neal III reported earlier that Francisco Liriano was going to throw BP again today. Now I see Joe Christensen just posted that the session went well without any pain. Joe also […]
Liriano needs to throw. His elbow is strong, it’s stronger than it ever was. It’s not getting stronger, a year is plenty of time for the ligaments to heal. What isn’t healed is his mind. I have confidence his go for broke attitude will help him go after the pitches and will reduce his mental block about the worry of having pain in his elbow again. He needs to throw. There are no limitations.
I agree Sweens and etcdelaware. His arm should be strong. He needs to build up endurance and regain control of pitches. For this he needs to build up game innings. This week starters should be going 3 IP and Liriano has not pitched any yet. Gardy had starters going 2 IP their first outing but my guess is Francisco will go 1 to start with. He will have to build up from there. I don’t think he will climb to where he needs to be by the end of the month in order to make the rotation, but I guess time will tell. Maybe Gardy will take 5 or 6 IP from him at the start of the season.
Encouraging news about Francisco’s session.Won’t now for sure until he starts throwing the hard slider without pain.If he can regain his slider we have ourselves our ace.
opps-Won’t know for sure
Gardy has already said that Liriano will not be put into the bullpen. HE WILL START. We also need to remember that he was throwing 3 innings in the Dominican before he came up here. He will be ready, there is no doubt in my mind.
Jo do you know if there will be a limited pitch count for the franchise this year? If it is around 100 pitches as the rumor goes how could they put him in the rotation? I would rather see the Twins do something similar to what the Braves did with Smoltz and if they can’t resign Nathan he could step into that role for a year.
BCofND,
Santana was pulled after 100 pitches his whole Twins career and he managed to stay in the rotation.
I think that Liriano should start the first month in the bullpen, giving him the innings he needs in middle relief then put him in the rotation, no point in using him at AAA if his arm feels good.
I think that Liriano should start the first month in the bullpen, giving him the innings he needs in middle relief then put him in the rotation, no point in using him at AAA if his arm feels good. We need him to return to “franchise”
sane i meant to say 100 innings my bad i think that number would be hard to achieve if he was in the rotation.
Was he throwing the slider in the Dominican league?
I hate the bullpen idea. I’d rather give him 2-3 rehab starts in AAA to start the year and then bring him back. It gets him used to pitching on 4-5 days rest routinely and gives him a chance to see how his arm feels after he’s thrown 60-70 pitches without a break.
He needs to build endurance again, he doesn’t need to come out of the pen for 1-2 innings and then sit around for a few days. We want him able to throw 100+ quality pitches, and throwing 30 and icing for the rest of the night isn’t going to get him there.
I think that Liriano should start the first month in the bullpen, giving him the innings he needs in middle relief then put him in the rotation, no point in using him at AAA if his arm feels good. We need him to return to “franchise”
No, he needs to be starting one way or the other. His workload can be easily monitored and managed in the rotation, the same cannot be said for the pen.
If he can pitch 5 innings every 5 days that is much better than being in relief. If we are planning to keep 12 pitchers let him build his arm strength.
Lets say he starts Thursday and pitches 2 innings, as the other pitchers have done after 40-pitch live batting practice session. He’d be ready for starts on March 11, 16, 21, 26, and April 1. Adding the customary inning per start, that would put him in line to pitch 7 innings on April 1, which is the second game of the season. While I don’t think he’ll start that game, he’s not so far behind that he couldn’t start it.
Don’t bullpen him. Start him with a tight pitch count - say, 80 - until we’re convinced he’s built up the arm strength & stamina to pitch more.
Starting will get him out there on a regular basis with scheduled time to recuperate between appearances, something you can’t guarantee you’ll get relieving.
Plus starting gives him more time to get warmed up than relieving ever would.
Take it slow with Franchise. I still think he belongs in the Majors, and if we have to… he pitches no more than 5 innings in his starts for the first 5-6 weeks of the season… no big deal to carry 12 pitchers when you have a LF,RF,1b, that never miss games, and you have Redmond as the backup catcher who would be ready if he took a bullet the day before. Punto as a backup infielder with either Buscher or Tolbert as the other backup infielder, and Monroe as the backup outfielder… Gomez as the likely candidate as the CF… that gives us more than enough flexibility for the first 2 months of the season when the days off are plentiful for a 12 man rotation.
BC,
I think you are correct on everything except Tolbert will not be close.
It will probably be Buscher or one of the CF-Derby losers.
Also, if Casilla wow’s them in ST, he could stick. If Casilla could actually get significant PT at SS and/or 2B, the Twins could have Gomez and Casilla in the nine-spot and one-spot stealing bases.
That would change the team’s offensive personality.
